Two events in this primary are what gave us Romney. Just two.
First, all of the Palin supporters refused to believe that she wouldn’t run, despite the fact that she did nothing to prepare for it (no state organizations, no signatures to get on ballots). And that resulted in a large number of conservatives not even bothering to look at the declared candidates. Furthermore, that delayed any chance of us gelling behind a declared candidate to stop Romney. So, by the time the deluded fools finally figured it out, they ended up panicking and jumping from candidate to candidate without really looking them over.
It was Palin’s fault? Please. It was Romney’s dishonest attacks and $$$ that caused people to jump from candidate to candidate. The reason we have Romney has been all about $$$ and the bombs he threw. Without that, he’d be sitting at home by now.
You weren’t here last year. The Palin supporters here were rabid dogs going after *ANYONE* that didn’t profess an undying worship at her altar.
If you tried to explain that she hadn’t formed any state campaigns or hadn’t tried to gather any signatures to get on the ballot... you, quite literally, ran the risk of getting banned. And her supporters frequently pings the administrators to do just that.
They were CONVINCED she would run and were *VERY* nasty about the other candidates.